Nhs‘rationing’

Well before Enoch Powell became notorious for his “Rivers of Blood” speech, in the early 1960s he had been one of the longest serving Ministers of Health south of the border, holding at the time liberal views about immigration.

He is remembered for his work to close old-fashioned mental hospitals, and his efforts to reduce NHS waiting lists, which in England during his tenure fell from 475,643 to 470,297 But they then quickly rose, to 498,972.

His ministerial stint caused him to regard waiting lists as a fundamental property of the NHS, a form of rationing. It is hard to disagree with his statement that the public was encouraged to believe that rationing in medical care was banished by the NHS, with the very idea being immoral and repugnant, and that there is a political convention that its existence must be strenuously denied.

In the 1960s it was possible to get away with such views, because in comparison with today the numbers were so small. But more than three quarters of a million Scots are currently waiting for health care. It is not surprising that NHS chief executives are thinking the unthinkable regarding radical reforms!

HUGH PENNINGTON

Aberdeen